Blood and Tears
by Rini-chan
Summary: Rated for darkiness, blood, strong scary themes, blood, darkiness, and blood. Did I mention blood? Not for the squeamish. Yet another transfer student comes to Domino around the time the killings start...coincidence? NOT A MARY SUE.
1. Beginning

Hiya peeps! Rini-chan here. This is an idea that came out of a very, very odd mind...*hides hands behind back guiltily* 

NO YAOI! No, really. I'm serious. No yaoi in this fic. I've learned that you can't please anybody when you involve pairings. There will be no lemons, limes, pineapples, OR canteloupes in this fic. It's rated entirely for graphic violence. Some very minor Tea bashing up ahead. 

/.../ = hikari to yami 

//...// = yami to hikari 

(So original, I know. Shut up.) 

  


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Blood and Tears   
Chapter 1 

A dark alleyway. 

A flicker of motion in the shadows. 

It strikes, the dark gleam of a knife piercing the shadows for a mere instant; then it pulls its prey further into the shadows to finish the kill. 

A slurping sound, barely audible. 

Someone strolls out of the shadows and down the street, to continue its business. 

Then all is still. 

(*)(*)(*)(*)(*) 

Yugi walked into homeroom and sat down. Joey was already there, slumped over on his desk as always. Joey didn't really wake up until third period. Tea was reading, and Tristan was late, as usual. 

Not really feeling awake enough for conversation himself, Yugi pulled out a book. He was about five pages in when- 

"Students, please welcome our new transfer student," the teacher beamed. How she beamed words, no one could understand, but this teacher managed it. She turned to the new student. "Could you please introduce yourself to the class, dear?" 

The girl gave a mutinous not-quite-glare to the teacher, but spoke. "Hi, my name is Katrina Valasa. If you call me Katrina I will personally pound your face into the concrete. You may call me Kat. Can I sit down now?" 

The teacher suppressed a sigh and nodded. 

Yugi glanced up at the new student absently, and dismissed her as less interesting than his book. Joey barely twitched. Tea walked over to her and tried to make conversation, thus proving that boys are often wiser than girls. "Katrina Valasa, that's a pretty name. Is Valasa a Viking name?" 

"I don't know. Refer to me as Katrina again, please." 

"Eheh...well, I'm Tea, and this is Tristan, and that's Yugi and Joey," she continued, smiling. 

"That's nice." Kat pulled out a book of her own. 

"Ah..." Tea was certainly not used to being ignored. "Where did you move from?" 

"Southeast Tasmania," Kat said, not looking up from her book. 

"Really?" 

"No." 

The bell rang, saving Tea from further conversation. The day passed uneventfully, as school days are supposed to, and the teachers assigned too much homework, as they are supposed to. 

No one knew how few days of normality remained to them, or they would have made sure to enjoy it. 

(*)(*)(*)(*)(*) 

"See you tomorrow, Mai!" the girl yelled from her doorstep. 

"Tomorrow, girl!" Mai replied, and sighed as she started walking to the bus stop. She had managed to lose her license - too many tickets in too little time. Ninety days. Majorly sucked. 

A footstep broke through her ruminations - just one footstep. As if someone was trying to be quiet. 

The streetlights on this street were broken or burned out - not uncommon in this neighborhood. 

She spun around to face whoever was stalking her. No one was there, but she could have sworn she saw a flicker of movement. 

It didn't repeat itself, so she slowly turned around again and started walking. 

A whisper of sound off to her right was all that warned her of the knife that slit her throat. The shadow pulled her out of view of the main street and laid her down in its lap, slurping greedily at her throat. Blood spurted onto its clothing, but it paid no mind, caught up in the bloodlust. 

The constant sound of traffic broke in on this...enchanting...scene, and it lifted its head reluctantly as it felt the spell take effect. Suddenly it grinned evilly and said- 

"1985, B positive." 

Like a connoisseur. It rose gracefully, looked down and tsked, turning its jacket inside out for the walk home. It was starting to run out of that heavy-duty stain remover. 

  


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*rereads last paragraph* o.O Don't ask...it's 12:30 in the morning and I have a rather weird sense of what properly relieves gory violence scenes. I'll go over this again in the morning and post it. Ja ne minna-san! 

Morning Note: I get really, really weird late at night...I'll go post this now. Ja ne! 

Later editing note: Didn't change all that much. I was just trying to make the tone of the earlier chapters somewhat darker and generally improve the writing quality. Not sure if I succeeded. Go repost now. Ja! 


	2. Not Good

Hiya minna-san! Rini-chan again, as always, with a reviewer to respond to! Spiffy! 

Tetsu: Arigatou! Heh...very good guesses, although you forgot Malik, but none are on the dot. 

And that's all my reviews. :( BUT ON WITH THE STORY ANYWAY! ^_^ 

/.../ = hikari to yami 

//...// = yami to hikari 

(I don't think any part of this story will be told from a POV other the one the first chapter was in, but I'm putting this in JIC. Also, Bakura means Yami Bakura in this fic and Ryou means Bakura.) 

  


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Blood and Tears   
Chapter 2 

Apparently the other girls hadn't learned Tea's lesson from yesterday, because they were still trying to indoctrinate Kat into their various cliques. 

"So, Kat, where are you from?" This was the fifth time she'd been asked this question. 

"I already told you, southern Tasmania." 

"Come on, Kat. That's the same answer you've been giving us, and we know it isn't true. I mean, _really._" The blonde leaned over on the table, causing Joey and Tristan to nearly swoon, Tea to glare and Yugi and Ryou to giggle. "You can tell us, we won't laugh at you." 

Kat raised an eyebrow. "Fine. I'm from Bree, in northern Eriador." 

"Really? I've never heard of Err-ee-aah-dorr...where is it? And who would name a town after a cheese...or was it the cheese named after the town?" 

Kat stared at her. "Please tell me you've heard of Lord of the Rings." 

"Lord of the Rings? I've heard of that, it's that movie by Peter Jackson, with the super-hot Orlando Bloom omigod he is *so* to die for-" 

"Right." She dove back into her book. 

"C'mon Kat, you don't like Orlando Bloom? I've heard some people think he's gay...but anyone that hot can simply not be gay, y'know?" 

"Somehow I fail to see your logic on that topic, but we're all entitled to our little delusions." 

"You're so weird, Kat, y'know that?" The blonde paused for a second, but only to choose another topic of chatter. "Where'd you get that scar on your hand? It looks kinda freaky. I mean, no offense or anything." 

"I had an unfortunate encounter with a sewing machine when I was little," she said shortly. 

"Wh- Oh, you accidently sewed your hand, you mean? Ouch!" The ditz winced in sympathy. "I accidently sewed my finger into the pillow I was making last year. It hurt so much, and they had to cut the pillow...it really sucked, I had to start all over and all, cuz of all the blood...the pillow turned out really pretty, it was a patchwork pillow with pink and purple patterns and-" 

She continued to rattle on about her cute little pillow with cute little stitches and cute little pink and purple hearts for-bloody-ever. 

"How does she do it?" Tristan asked. 

"You mean Kat or the blond?" Yugi asked. 

"Kat." 

"It looks like she's mumbling to herself," Ryou observed. 

Yami came out, looked at her...and sweatdropped. He turned. "She's mumbling 'Must restrain my inner axe murderer' over and over again." (A/N: I'm assuming for the sake of the moment that Yami knows how to read lips. It seems like the type of thing he would learn how to do.) 

Everyone sweatdropped. Then they all burst out into quiet hysterics, drawing the attention of everyone in the class. The bell rang, and Kat almost ran out the door to her locker...only to be accosted by another girl, a brunette this time. The girl probably noticed her twitching, though, because all she said was a quick "Hi." 

"We're meeting at the game shop today, right?" Joey asked Yugi. 

"Yeah, I think Grandpa got a new shipment this morning." 

"Cool. Seeya later." He split off to his locker. 

"Later, Yugi." 

"Seeya." 

"Bye." 

Yugi went to his locker, then started home. He was soon joined by Joey, Tristan and Tea, and they chattered about the upcoming Duel Monsters tournament and the new set of cards. When they walked in the door of the game shop, Grandpa was watching the news. 

"More about this after these messages-" 

"Hey, dat's Mai!" Joey exclaimed. 

"You're right, Joey, and she looks terrible!" Yugi said. 

"Yeah...she's so pale and all-" Tea cut off abruptly. 

There was an uncomfortable silence. Then, "Yami says she's dead," Yugi said softly. 

The silence stretched out. Everyone seemed at a loss for words. Then Yugi cleared his throat. "Are any of you hungry? I can get snacks-" 

"Do you even need to ask, Yugi?" Tristan joked. "With Joey over here, you should know the answer!" But even this humor seemed unnaturally forced. 

"Okay," Yugi said, rather weakly. "Holler when the news starts up again, please?" He went into the kitchen. 

//This isn't good, Yugi,// Yami said worriedly. //Someone cast a Shadow spell last night. I couldn't tell what it was...I just assumed it was Bakura - which it may have been, but...// 

/You're right, Yami. This definitely isn't good./ 

//I'm positive the spell had something to do with death, though, and it was most likely involved with Mai's death.// 

/Do you think I should tell the rest of the gang?/ 

//No. We need something more concrete. But ask Ryou if he noticed his yami doing anything...odd last night.// 

/Will do./ He hastily grabbed some chips and dip, and exited just as Tea yelled that the news was on again. 

(*)(*)(*)(*)(*) 

A few streets away, in another ordinary suburban house, someone sat watching the news. 

The person grinned evilly to themself. _The game is afoot...they will know, now. Now it is just a matter of time..._

An evil laugh echoed softly through the first floor. 

  


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I think I'll end it there...please be nice and leave a review. *gets her drawing of Chibi Mai and Mokuba out* How can you say no to these peeps? ^_^; 

Much later editor's note: Man, this chapter sucked. Major editing here. Not much else to say. Ja! Review! 


	3. Troubling Revelations

No reviews...:( I feel so unloved...*huggles Cthulhu* *sighs heavily* Stupid computer, had to reboot...now I have to retype what I just wrote. >_ 

But in any case. 

On a slightly unrelated note, I think that the comment I'm most proud of about this story was said by Saria-chan, who emailed me: "*shiver* I'm definitely not going down any dark alleyways anytime soon." Or something along those lines, anyway. ^_^ Which reminds me, go read Saria-chan's fics. Her penname is Sage Saria. 

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Blood and Tears   
Chapter 3 

It was a morning like any other, to the average person. The sun was shining, it wasn't too cold or too warm; the toast landed butter-side-down; people had died and been born, and the world was in balance. 

To a select few residents in a medium-sized city in an out-of-the-way corner of the world, though, this morning was very wrong. And to an even selecter few people of those residents, this morning was _dreadfully_ wrong. 

Other residents in this medium-sized city shared that sentiment, of course. The type of thing that causes this wrongness tends to leave residues; and in any kind of civilization, you get those people who were just dumped and think it's a crime against humanity for the sun to be shining. These select residents, however, had...more important reasons to believe that this morning was dreadfully wrong. 

For one thing, a friend had just been killed for no apparent reason. 

For another, their lives were in danger. 

For a third, there was a sincere danger that the world was going to come to an end within a month, although only two of them suspected this. 

Wonderful thoughts to start the morning off with, aren't they? 

But in any case, let us continue with the story. 

Yugi, Joey, Tea and Tristan were walking to school, like they would do on any normal morning. What was not normal, though, was the permeating silence that no one dared to break, not even Ryou, who joined them about five blocks away from the school. 

The silence was eventually broken, however. "Ryou, can I talk with you for a second?" Yugi asked. 

Ryou nodded, and they fell behind the group. Yugi cleared his throat nervously. "Um...did you notice your yami doing anything...suspicious last night?" 

Ryou looked at him. "Not really...unless you count telling me to warn you to be careful as something suspicious..." He paused. "He wants to talk to your yami." 

Yugi closed his eyes. /Yami?/ 

//Mm?// 

/Bakura wants to talk to you.../ 

Yugi could feel his yami's indecision, as caution warred with curiousity and a need for information. Then, with barely a word he found himself in his soul room. 

Back in the real world, Yami opened his eyes and looked at Ryou. "Do you think he's trying anything?" 

Ryou shook his head. "He seems more preoccupied than smug right now...and-" 

He was cut off as Bakura forced his way out. "You felt it last night, didn't you?" 

"Yes," Yami said slightly dubiously. "I thought it was you..." 

"It wasn't me, but I know what spell it was-" 

"Whyever am I not surprised-" 

"Stuff it, _Pharoah_," Bakura snarled. "In case you hadn't noticed, I am _trying_ to help here-" 

"Yeah, so you-" Yami clenched his jaw. "Might I propose a truce for the duration of this conversation?" After a look from Bakura, he hastily added "We can extend it afterwards if we deem it necessary." 

/Spoken like a lawyer,/ Yugi put in. 

//Is that supposed to be an insult of some sort?// Yami asked innocently. 

"As I was saying," Bakura continued, "I know what spell it was, and I can track who the caster was. But it'll take me about a week. It's a very complicated spell." 

"Isn't there anything you can do to speed it up?" Yami asked desperately. "Tombrobber, I fear we may not have a week. This is important!" 

"I know this is important, Pharoah!" the tombrobber hissed. "I would think I should know how important it is better than you! Do you want to know what that spell does? It takes the life of another human being and adds it to the caster's power! _All_ of their energy, Pharoah!" 

Yami was slackjawed - or as slackjawed as the former Pharoah would let himself be, anyway - as Bakura continued. "Even if these killings continue at the rate of one every _other_ night, we don't have a week. Two more lives will see him strong enough to take on me and my twerp of an other, and the Ishtars, and then he'll be more than strong enough to take you on. But this is the only thing I can think of to do - unless you want me to start killing everyone in the city," he added with a challenging stare. He looked rather hopeful to Yami's eye. 

Yami sighed, shaking his head. "Truce until we see the caster dead?" he offered. 

"Truce," Bakura said, and Pharoah and tombrobber shook hands. "We'd better switch," the thief added, eyeing the approaching school building. 

"You first," the Pharoah replied. 

(*)(*)(*)(*)(*) 

When they walked into the Game Shop that afternoon, the news was on again. Mako Tsunami, on a visit to a relative in the city, had been found dead in an alleyway. 

One. 

And that night, Bakura initiated the first stage of the location spell. 

  


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*shivers* Please review! 

Much later editor's note: Not *much* change here. Just little bits. Overall I think this chapter was fairly good. Ja! 


	4. Darkness and Death

Konn-ichi-wa! ^_^ 

I know I said no citrusy anything in this fic. That holds true. There is sick, demented, undescriptive kissing, but nothing citrusy. ^_^;; 

No review replies here...review onegai! 

  


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Blood and Tears   
Chapter Four 

It was quarter to midnight. The witching hour, when everything stood still for a fraction of a second. When wind blew, fire roared, and a breath of the supernatural whispered from the space between worlds. The hour when all major works of magic were performed. 

The mansion was dark. For once the owner wasn't staying up to all hours with office work, and the brother wasn't up on the computer or playing a video game. The maids were long gone. Security guards were at the entrances, but other than that, the house was dark and silent. 

Someone padded across the grounds. It was dressed in close-fitting black clothing. Black makeup obscured its face, and its hair was bound in a black scarf. The only spots of color in this ensemble were its eyes, which shone dully in the moonless night. A shadow among shadows, it slipped silently betwen the trees that dotted the enormous lawn. 

As it approached the house, its eyes darted, searching the shadows for any surprises. Finding none, it climbed up the artfully rough brick wall easily with the help of a drainpipe, and was soon clambering over the roof to the skylight it knew was there. It perched on the glass for a moment to exchange its shoes for quieter slippers, carefully placing them in a previously unseen pack on its back. It then jimmied the lock and dropped silently to the floor. It was in one of the guest rooms. 

Catfooting over to the door and finding it unlocked, it reached into its pack once more and pulled out blueprints. Its destination was two floors down, where the highest concentration of guards would be; there shouldn't be any between here and there, though, as no one bothered to guard the top rooms unless someone was there. Which it had made sure there wasn't. 

The shadow ghosted silently down the hall to the maids' stairwell - the elevator would make too much noise. Two double flights of stairs, this door here; it slipped two knives out of its pockets as it opened the door with a slight creak. 

Ten seconds of flurried movement, and six guards were dead. 

The shadow retrieved its knives from the throats of two guards and licked them clean, a smirk curling at the corners of its lips. Leaving them, it walked silently down the corridor to the first stop. There are no guards at this door, as the inhabitant values his rest. Finding it unlocked, the shadow slips inside. 

A very little bit of light comes from the bathroom, more than enough for the intruder to survey the figure laying in the rather large bed. It licked its lips in anticipation; the boy is rather beautiful, in a way. It's going to enjoy this. It sighs slightly, wishing it could make it a drawn out death for a change...but no. The boy would make too much noise. Pity. 

It saunters up to the bed and strips the covers off the sleeping figure. The boy recoils slightly, though the air was warm; it's still autumn. The shadow swings its leg over the boy's torso, straddling his chest. 

It is at this time that the boy wakes up. 

Before he can make any noise, the shadow captures his lips in a kiss, forcing its tongue deep into his mouth. It slides one of its knives along his neck, smirking at the slight shiver that runs through the boy's body. 

Then it slits his throat. Blood floods his mouth, and the shadow's. 

And, at exactly ten minutes to midnight, such primal delight floods the shadow's body that it nearly moans, almost forgetting itself. 

The moment passes, as the shadow starts lapping up the blood covering the boy's neck and pooling on the sheets. It soon finishes, and keeping the magic active, it closes the door and goes down the hall to another room. It is also unlocked, and creaks slightly as the shadow opens it - barely a whisper of sound, but the sleeping figure goes tense on the bed. Repressing a grimace and sighing, the shadow casts a small silence charm around the room, regretting the use of power. 

Then it slithers up to the bed, throwing the covers off and slamming its hand down on the frightened boy's throat in a single fluid motion. 

"Hello, little Mokuba," it hisses pleasantly. "How are you this fine evening?" 

"Wh-what do you want?" 

"What do I want?" The shadow throws back its head and laughs. "Such a complicated question, young Mokuba, and yet so simple. What I want right now is your life." It smirks as it lowers its face closer to Mokuba's. "But I'm going to take my time taking it." 

"What do you mean? I-I'll scream, yell, my brother will come and - and take you away and make you sorry-" 

The shadow chuckles. "Go ahead, little Mokuba. Scream, yell, it will be so amusing. No one will hear you. Your brother? He's dead." It smirks outright. "So sorry to be the bearer of bad news." 

Mokuba simply looks at it in growing terror. 

"You know what I'll do first?" the shadow sneers, its face inches from Mokuba's. "I think I'll start by peeling all the skin off your arms. Then I think I'll move to your chest...that should be nice and painful without knocking you out." It sighs rapturously. "It's been so _long_ since I've been able to give someone a properly long and drawn-out death! You have no idea how much fun I'm going to have, little Mokuba..." It leans forward, smirking sadistically and touching its tongue to Mokuba's lips. Mokuba lets out a small whimper. 

"Let's begin, shall we?" 

***** 

The shadow lounges cat-like on the blood-soaked bed, eyes slitted in satiation. It is quarter past midnight, and time for it to be going, but it lingers on, soaked in its handiwork. Eventually it does get up, though. It licks its knives clean and slides them into their respective sheathes, and makes its way downstairs to the basement. 

Here, it removes the outermost layer of black clothing and places it on the floor. It does the same to the slippers and its blood-soaked socks, and magicks the rest of its clothing clean with a heady surge of newly-acquired power that leaves it rather giddy. It reaches into its pack and pulls out a package of wipes, with which it cleans the makeup off its face, and drops each of them on top of the pile on the floor. It then grabs a toolbox that's down here and goes to work on a certain set of pipes. After about ten minutes of straining, it gives up and uses magic to do it, grimacing as the stench of natural gas fills the room. 

It goes back upstairs and starts going around opening windows. It's forced to kill several more guards, as they are positioned so that each can see at least one other pair; _smart of them,_ the shadow notes as it slips through the last window. 

_But it didn't save them._

It slips off through the more wooded end of the grounds, towards the sidewalk. At the edge of the woods, it turns for a moment. It holds up its hand; a spark appears between the thumb and forefinger. The shadow sends it off towards the mansion with a flick of its hand, and takes off for the sidewalk. 

There is no one around to see a pale-faced shadow burst out of the trees onto well-lit sidewalk, no longer a shadow, but the explosion of the Kaiba mansion three seconds later draws the attention of all with ears to hear. 

And at exactly one-thirty in the morning, a tall, pale student dressed all in black joins the crowd that gathers to watch the fire. 

(*)(*)(*)(*)(*) 

And in another suburban household across town, Bakura, who had been performing the third stage of the location spell, turned his head. If he could look through walls, he would see the Kaiba mansion in flames, and a crowd of teenagers. 

_Three. _

Gods save us all... 

  


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...*reading over chapter* *shivering* I think Edmondia Dantes is starting to rub off on me...for those of you who don't know, Edmondia Dantes is an excellent author who does psychopaths and dementia very well. You may know her as the author of "Possession" or "Do What You Have To Do". Her stuff is very excellent, but also rather scary, except for "Do What You Have To Do", which is just plain hilarious. 

But all in all, I think this chapter turned out rather well. 

Now, I'm sure you all realize from your experience that reviews make authors feel all happy and sunny inside. And I'm sure you all know that authors that feel all happy and sunny inside write faster. So, if you wish there to be more chapters (for any of my stories) then the logical thing to do would be to review! Simple, ne? Ja ne! Anata-tachi wa taisetsu na yo! Volere e passegiare la questa matita, per favore, e corri alla chiesa perche della tua gatta! ^_~V 


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